Our future?

Some elderly Saudis are being disposed of by their families who dump them off in front of area hospitals and speed away, leaving doctors furious and flabbergasted by this bizarre, cruel behavior.

Recently, three separate families abandoned their parents — and their responsibilities — at King Fahd Hospital.

In an incident at the hospital on Tuesday, a woman in her late 80s who was abandoned by her son there 10 days earlier was reunited with him. During her hospital stay, officials tried several times to get in touch with her family, who denied her existence.

Security guards were able to trace her taxi-driver son who ditched her at the hospital. He was recognized as a regular visitor to the premises, frequently dropping off passengers at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) entrance....

Not all of the elderly are so lucky.

"Uncle Hamed," as he’s called at the hospital, was abandoned during Ramadan and still lies on a King Fahd Hospital bed. He is blind, emaciated and 87 years old.

Officials have tried to find a person to contact, but the man has no identification — and no one knows who left him at the hospital....

--Arab News, 2/3/05

(Link via Skimble.)